Formalities Quotes

Be polite. Write diplomatically. Even in a declaration of war one observes the rules of politeness.

Ceremonies are the outworks of manners.

Peoples do not defy repression and death, nor do they remain for nights on end protesting energetically, just because of merely formal matters.

Pretending is the grease of non-relationships. Pretending is how you and I get through the day without ever having to know each other. When I walk in the room, you say to me, 'How are you?' Well, you don't want to know. And, frankly, I don't want to tell you. So I just say, 'Fine,' and you go, 'Fine.' And off we go.

When people complain of the decay of manners they have in mind not the impudent abbreviations of the crowd, but the decline in bowing and scraping and in speaking of one's employer as "the master." What the rich mean by the good manners of the poor is usually not civility, but servility.

All barbarous nations are commonly great observers of ceremonies.

There's hearings on everything. They're kabuki theater.

All ceremonies are in themselves very silly things; but yet, a man of the world should know them. They are the outworks of Mannersand Decency, which would be too often broken in upon, if it were not for that defence, which keeps the enemy at a proper distance.

An official man is always an official man, and has a wild belief in the value of Reports.

There's so much paperwork that goes with changing a name.

Ceremony is an invention to take off the uneasy feeling which we derive from knowing ourselves to be less the object of love and esteem with a fellow-creature than some other person is. It endeavours to make up, by superior attentions in little points, for that invidious preference which it is forced to deny in the greater.

Everything ends this way in France. Weddings, christenings, duels, burials, swindles, affairs of state—everything is a pretext for a good dinner.

From the time I've landed in India and wherever I've travelled, I've only experienced politeness and courtesy. There has been no hatred whatsoever. But I strongly feel every country has its formalities and rules that one has to abide by. I believe in respecting that, as it is in the best interests of everyone.

Truth and ceremony are two things.

Ceremony keeps up things: 'tis like a penny glass to a rich spirit, or some excellent water; without it the water were spilt, and the spirit lost.

One listens to one's lawyer prattle on as long as one can stand it and then signs where indicated.

No man is in love when he marries. He may have loved before; I have even heard he has sometimes loved after: but at the time never. There is something in the formalities of the matrimonial preparations that drive away all the little cupidons.

In statesmanship get the formalities right, never mind about the moralities.

Ritual and ceremony in their due times kept the world under the sky and the stars in their courses. It was astonishing what ritual and ceremony could do.

And now we have the formalities over, we'll have the National Anthems.

Good manners, to those one does not love, are no more a breach of truth, than "your humble servant," at the bottom of a challengeis; they are universally agreed upon, and understand to be things of course. They are necessary guards of the decency and peace of society.

It starts when you begin to overlook good manners. Any time you quit hearing Sir and Mam the end is pretty much in sight.

One must observe the proper rites.

It's nice to see you again, Laura." "Thank you, Mrs. T-" "No, no, no. Please, my name is-" "Mud," I suggested. "Mud Barfbag Taylor. Call her Asshat for short." ~Laura, Antonia, Betsy

I confess to a prejudice against officialism and a dread of bureaucracy.